Longboarder cafe to move across from theater

Kurt Leiss, owner of The Longboarder Cafe, stands next to a mural of his family at the restaurant. Because of a rent increase, the restaurant will be moving closer to the beach. The popular cafe has been at Pier View Way and Coast Highway for about 12 years.
— John Gastaldo / UNION-TRIBUNE

Kurt Leiss, owner of The Longboarder Cafe, stands next to a mural of his family at the restaurant. Because of a rent increase, the restaurant will be moving closer to the beach. The popular cafe has been at Pier View Way and Coast Highway for about 12 years.
— John Gastaldo / UNION-TRIBUNE

OCEANSIDE  Kurt and Gina Leiss were looking at losing their family business, but have landed in a new downtown location that may be even better than their old one.

Their restaurant, the iconic Longboarder Cafe in downtown Oceanside, was facing possible closure after their lease ran out at a building on one of the city’s most desirable corners: Pier View Way and Coast Highway, across the street from the Civic Center.

But they just signed a lease on a new spot, directly across from the Regal Cinemas, Kurt Leiss said last week.

“It’s a good corner,” he said. “Look out the window and see the Regal theater, and you can actually see the ocean.”

That means the restaurant will move its employees, menu and beach décor that has become a hit with tourists and residents.

But city officials and residents are concerned that while the restaurant was saved, it will make way for a convenience store.

The city has worked over the years to discard its honky-tonk past and make downtown more tourist- and resident-friendly. Strip clubs, tattoo parlors and other seedy establishments are out. Restaurants, shops and entertainment are in.

So news that the Longboarder was being pushed out in favor of a convenience store didn’t go over well with some.

Clayton Parker, whose surf murals decorate the Longboarder’s walls, and his wife have gathered 900 signatures on petitions to save the restaurant.

“We just simply were trying to protest another convenience store and the removal of a landmark for Oceanside,” Parker said.

The Longboarder is Kurt Leiss’ second job. His first one is as a Los Angeles police officer. He’s also in the Marine Reserves.

Gina Leiss runs the cafe, which is known for its pancakes, hamburgers and friendly service.

“We’ve been here 11, 12 years,” Kurt Leiss said while sitting before a cafe mural. He said his wife began as a waitress at the Longboarder when it was in south Oceanside, and the couple gradually bought out the owners and moved it downtown.

Kurt Leiss said that when the lease expired in April the property manager told him a convenience-store chain was interested in the location. He said he couldn’t match the rent of the convenience store’s higher offer, so he was out.

He said he understands business and that the owner is free to maximize his income, but he questions the decision to put another convenience store downtown.

“If you look at downtown there’s a convenience store two blocks in every direction,” Leiss said.

A Quik Korner Market is two blocks south, and a Circle K is three blocks north.

The owner would need City Council to approve a conditional use permit for another convenience store, and Mayor Jim Wood isn’t sure of the need for one.

“It wouldn’t do anything for us,” Wood said. A convenience store “is going to want to sell alcohol, and that’s the last thing we want.”

A spokeswoman for the property manager, Ohio-based Somerset Development, declined to comment on the tenant situation.

Leiss said the Longboarder was asked to vacate its current home by June 30, but he hopes to extend that to allow more time to move.